Search For Paradise: Book one: The Beginning
by limeygirl714
Summary: This is what you might call a vague crossover.it is set when the XPG which in this story is named the Black She-Wolf is first launched.there is a slight crossover with wolf's rain. The story revolves around Erika Summers and her crew.R&R please.
1. Dreams, Nightmares and Spaceships

Search For Paradise, Book one: The Beginning

Search for Paradise, Book one: The Beginning

Chapter 1: Dreams, Nightmares and Spaceships.

Places. Names. Objects. My head fills with these things as I try to remember…remember what? Sweat drips from my brow. Suddenly, darkness. Everywhere. Filling my vision. My entire being. I hear a voice from not too far off. "Erika?" It was a man. A whisper. A question. "Who's there?" I asked them. Still, darkness. "Clueless as usual, eh, Erika?" The man said playfully. I moved my head this way and that, looking for some source of light. "How do you know my name!?" I shouted to the darkness. "Don't you recognise me?" as the other person said this, a light appeared behind them and I saw a silhouette standing tall. The person threw back their head and laughed, mocking me. As the light stretched out I knew I was about to see his face…

My eyes flickered open, taking in the new day. "That dream…again" I whispered to myself. I looked all around my apartment room. "Urgh! I hate this!" My door opened and my roommate walked in. Ren Nightingale walked across the floor to my bed and flopped down onto the end of it. "What's up, 'Rika?" she said using her annoying nickname. "Nothing…I had that dream again though." Ren almost dropped the piece of toast she had in her hand. "Did you see his face this time?" She was obsessed with the man in my dreams. Or rather, nightmares. "No, I didn't. You have a weird taste in men, Renny." I sighed. Ren stared at me, gaping. "Well?" I asked. "Are you getting ready for work? Or are you going to fake sick and make me bring Joey up here?" Ren and I lived in a giant compound in Canada; we worked in the compound as part of the crew of the space ship that was housed there. Joey was Ren's main love interest. At the mention of his name, Ren walked out, as she left I stood up; walking towards my wardrobe I picked out my work clothes and headed for the bathroom.

An hour later Ren and I made our way down to the docking bay. A gigantic black ship was placed in the middle of it all. A man with black hair and piercing, stormy grey eyes stood there next to a taller, more muscular man with golden eyes and silvery-white hair. The first man was Joey, the navigator, and the second was Exael, the weapons specialist. They waved as they saw us walk through the doors. The four of us had worked together since we were in our early teens. Nothing has really changed since then. Joey is still a joker; Ren is still serious about going out with him. I'm still trying to break up silly quibbling, but Exael has changed. When I first met the younger version of my friend he was unemotional and hardened, he had grow up as a kind of monk, learning how to be free of emotion whilst also learning to transform into a wolf. Nowadays he was warm and friendly, not bothering to keep his feelings hidden, he was my best friend next to Ren. I looked over to my friends, then behind them at the large black ship. My ship. "Good morning Captain Summers!" Joey said in an army salute.

"Whatever, Joey." I said sleepily.

"Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning. Did Erika have a bad dream?" he laughed. I glared over at my crew-mate.

"Ren? Did you tell anyone anything?" I asked referring to my recurring nightmares. Renny just looked at the floor, innocently. "Urgh! Never mind. Let's get to work; my Grandpa wants to run a simulation test again. Hopefully this time our navigator won't start making chicken noises again." I said glaring at Joey once again. He simply smiled back, as I shook my head.

I sat in my chair on the bridge of the ship, looking at the screen as the computer spoke to me. "Life support systems are failing. Please evacuate the ship Captain Summers." Nom said in her clear voice. "Not on your hard drive, Nom!" I shouted pressing a few buttons. "Captain Summers I do advise that you vacate the ship." I continued pressing the buttons frantically, typing some code into the computer. "Vacate to where? If this was really happening then we'd be in outer space. Okay, shut off the air ducts for twenty seconds and then open them up." I said, regaining calmness and sitting back in my chair. Twenty seconds later the air ducts were open again and the life support systems were back online. My grandfather, the man in charge of the project, was not happy. "Erika! Stop looking so smug and get to the control room, right now!" I gaped; I had gotten everything back online hadn't I? I had completed the test, hadn't I? As I walked toward the control room I wondered what I had done wrong. "Why the hell didn't you evacuate the ship!?" My grandfather screamed at me. He was slightly shorter than I was but he made up for his size in his attitude. "The simulation is _supposedly _meant to teach you how to deal with a crisis, _whilst you are in outer space!_" I said back, shouting the last part. "Where would I evacuate to!?" Grandpa glared at me. "Oh, I don't know…_the escape pods!_" He shouted. Isn't it lovely when you have a conversation with your last living relative? Not. "What, so I can live in a cramped space with four other people and barely enough food for a mouse!?" I screamed, towering over him. "If you don't want to live in these conditions, then leave!" I stormed out of the room when he said this. Running past the crew, sprinted up the stairs and opened the door to the roof of the compound. This was my sanctuary. When I first came to work in the compound at the age of thirteen I had a fight with my grandfather, the first place I had run to was the roof. As far as I knew no-one else went up there, so I usually went up to cool off. Even when I wasn't angry I would just go up to relax or watch the sunset, Ren always asked me where I had been when I came back. "Paradise." I would say, simply. I left the chair folded and sat on the very edge of the roof, staring out at the horizon and seeing the blood red sky as the sun began to set. "Had a rough day, captain?" Said a deep voice from behind me.


	2. Something To Do

Search for Paradise, Book one: The beginning

Search for Paradise, Book one: The beginning

Chapter 02: Something to do.

I slowly turned to face the other person. Exael sat on the edge next to me. "You could say that." I mumbled. He tilted his head to one side, looking confused.

"What happened back there?" Exael asked, pointing his thumb at the door. I sighed, looking straight ahead. "My grandfather and I had an argument. I didn't know that anyone else came up here. Let alone you." He chuckled slightly.

"I have been coming up here ever since my grandfather died. I come here every morning and every evening, to howl for his soul. He used to do it for my grandmother, though never for my parents." He said cheerily, though he growled slightly as he said about his parents. Exael's grandfather had killed his parents, although he had found out the day they were murdered, he always stuck with his grandfather, afraid to lose him too. "Anyway." He said trying to change the subject. "How're you?" He nudged my shoulder, and began to stare out too.

"I've been better." I said quietly.

"Hmm. What was it that Joey was saying this morning, about a dream?" He asked me, looking for a conversation.

"I-I've been having…nightmares. Recurring nightmares." I said shakily, I had only told Renny about the dreams, even then I had been shaky when talking about them. "Always, darkness. I'm looking for something, trying to remember something, but I can't. Then there's a man's voice, and a silhouette of him. Just before I can see his face I wake up." I told him, looking down at my knees. "I don't know why but…it scares me." I said looking up into his golden eyes. The eyes of a wolf. He moved forward and pulled me into a tight embrace. "Don't worry, Erika. No-one will hurt, not while I'm here." I hugged back letting a single tear fall from my eyes. I don't know why I cried, but although I knew no-one would hurt me it felt good to finally hear the words. "There's no need to cry Erika." Exael whispered. I wiped the tears from my cheeks and looked into his eyes again.

"Thank you, Exael." I let go of him and stood up. He nodded to me, turning back to the sunset. The deep reds and oranges had turned paler and were turning yellow and near blue.

I walked down the stairs to my room, seeing Ren staring out of the window. "What's up, Ren?" I asked her.

"Nothing. Where've you been?" She replied, distantly, as though no-one but her existed.

"The roof." I said quietly, closing my room door. I walked over to the bed and jumped onto it, quickly moving so I could see underneath it. Pulling out a box I carefully lifted the lid from it. A mess of pictures and paintings lay inside, along with scraps of paper covered in writing. I picked out a picture of my parents and another of my friends and me. The picture of my parents was one of the few I had of them. It was from my first birthday. The other which was of my friends, had been from the day we had began working together. I placed the box under my bed again and got changed out of my work clothes.

The land around the compound was completely wasted but there were small places, much like oasis' in deserts. There had been a war there, around sixty years before. It destroyed the land, so the people who had lived there fled. No-one dared come into the battlegrounds anymore. It was the perfect place to keep a secret, especially a big one. I lay on top of my bed, wide awake, wondering what I could do at the time. Going out for a walk wasn't such a bad idea, although I knew my grandfather would forbid it. Looking around the room, I picked up my cell phone. I punched in Joey's number. "Joey, come to my apartment. Bring Exael with you." I said quickly hanging up. I jumped off of my bed and ran into Ren's room. "Renny, hurry up, get ready." I told her in a harsh whisper. I walked out of her room and back into my own, throwing open the wardrobe. Digging through the mess of clothes, I picked out a large length of rope and put it over my shoulder. I walked back into the living room as the doorbell rang, opening it I ushered Joey and Exael in. Ren walked out of her room. "What the hell is going on, Erika?" she asked, walking straight past the others. "We're sneaking out of this hell-hole, that's what's going on, Ren." I told her, opening the window and looking down at the ground. Exael smiled from ear to ear and Joey simply laughed. "You think we'll be able to get out through the window?" he chuckled.

"I'd like to see you come up with something better, Joe." I said harshly, judging the distance to the ground. Joey chuckled again, grinning devilishly.

"As a matter of fact, I do." He said, as I turned to face him.

As I followed Joey down the stairs I wondered where he was taking us. Even in the time I had lived in the compound I hadn't been into the basements before. He stopped as we came to a corner, footsteps were coming our way. I walked forward and around the corner to see a man dressed in a chef's uniform carrying a tray of empty plates. I nodded as he passed and smiled. The others followed as Joey took the lead again and led us into the kitchens. He turned a bucket upside down and stood on it, looking through a small window that was at ground level (The kitchens were below ground). I helped him to pull the window open and we climbed out one by one. We looked out, the barren landscape seeming almost welcome. "I know that there's a non-toxic lake, about three miles…that way!" Joey told us, pointing into the far distance.

"Good. Maybe we'll get back tomorrow morning." I said sarcastically. Joey simply smiled back at me.

"That's why I brought these." He said, throwing down a small cube onto the ground. Suddenly a large red car popped up from where the cube had landed. Joey laughed and opened the door. "A little something I asked Techie to help me with." Techie was the mechanical engineer for our ship, Joey and he were cousins. He closed the door of the drivers seat and we all got in.


End file.
